Revision as of 03:20, 9 January 2009

CHAPTER XIV

THE "LUSITANIA"---AND AFTER

I

THE news of the Lusitania was received at the American
Embassy at four o'clock on the afternoon of May 7, 1915. At that
time preparations were under way for a dinner in honour of Colonel
and Mrs. House; the first Lusitania announcement declared
that only the ship itself had been destroyed and that all the
passengers and members of the crew had been saved; there was,
therefore, no good reason for abandoning this dinner.

At about seven o'clock, the Ambassador came home; his manner
showed that something extraordinary had taken place; there were
no outward signs of emotion, but he was very serious. The first
news, he now informed Mrs. Page, had been a mistake; more than
one thousand men, women, and children had lost their lives, and
more than one hundred of these were American citizens. It was
too late to postpone the dinner but that affair was one of the
most tragic in the social history of London. The Ambassador was
constantly receiving bulletins from his Chancery, and these, as
quickly as they were received, he read to his guests. His voice
was quiet and subdued; there were no indications of excitement
in his manner or in that of his friends, and hardly of suppressed
emotion.

The atmosphere was rather that of dumb stupefaction. The news
seemed to have dulled everyone's capacity for thought and even
for feeling. If any one spoke, it was in whispers. Afterward,
in the drawing room, this same mental state was the prevailing
one; there was little denunciation of Germany and practically
no discussion as to the consequences of the crime; everyone's
thought was engrossed by the harrowing and unbelievable facts
which the Ambassador was reading from the little yellow slips
that were periodically brought in. An irresistible fascination
evidently kept everybody in the room; the guests stayed late,
eager for every new item. When they finally left, one after another,
their manner was still abstracted and they said their good-nights
in low voices. There were two reasons for this behaviour. The
first was that the Ambassador and his guests had received the
details of the greatest infamy which any supposedly civilized
state had perpetrated since the massacre of Saint Bartholomew.
The second was the conviction that the United States would at
once declare war on Germany.

On this latter point several of the guests expressed their
ideas and one of the most shocked and outspoken was Colonel House.
For a month the President's personal representative had been discussing
with British statesmen possible openings for mediation, but all
his hopes in this direction now vanished. That President Wilson
would act with the utmost energy Colonel House took for granted.
This act, he evidently believed, left the United States no option.
"We shall be at war with Germany within a month," he
declared.

The feeling that prevailed in the Embassy this evening was
the one that existed everywhere in London for several days. Emotionally
the event acted like an anæsthetic. This was certainly the
condition of all Americans associated with the American Embassy,
especially Page himself. A day or two after the sinking the Ambassador
went to Euston Station, at an early hour in the morning, to receive
the American survivors. The hundred or more men and women who
shambled from the train made a listless and bedraggled gathering.
Their grotesque clothes, torn and unkempt---for practically none
had had the opportunity of obtaining a change of dress---their
expressionless faces, their lustreless eyes, their uncertain and
bewildered walk, faintly reflected an experience such as comes
to few people in this world. The most noticeable thing about these
unfortunates was their lack of interest in their surroundings;
everything had apparently been reduced to a blank; the fact that
practically none made any reference to their ordeal, or could
be induced to discuss it, was a matter of common talk in London.
And something of this disposition now became noticeable in Page
himself. He wrote his dispatches to Washington in an abstracted
mood; he went through his duties almost with the detachment of
a sleep-walker; like the Lusitania survivors, he could
not talk much at that time about the scenes that had taken place
off the coast of Ireland. Yet there were many indications that
he was thinking about them, and his thoughts, as his letters reveal,
were concerned with more things than the tragedy itself. He believed
that his country was now face to face with its destiny. What would
Washington do?

Page had a characteristic way of thinking out his problems.
He performed his routine work at the Chancery in the daytime,
but his really serious thinking he did in his own room at night.
The picture is still a vivid one in the recollection of his family
and his other intimates. Even at this time Page's health was not
good, yet he frequently spent the evening at his office in Grosvenor
Gardens, and when the long day's labours were finished, he would
walk rather wearily to his home at No. 6 Grosvenor Square. He
would enter the house slowly---and his walk became slower and
more tired as the months went by---go up to his room and cross
to the fireplace, so apparently wrapped up in his own thoughts
that he hardly greeted members of his own family. A wood fire
was kept burning for him, winter and summer alike; Page would
put on his dressing gown, drop into a friendly chair, and sit
there, doing nothing, reading nothing, saying nothing ---only
thinking. Sometimes he would stay for an hour; not infrequently
he would remain till two, three, or four o'clock in the morning;
occasions were not unknown when his almost motionless figure would
be in this same place at daybreak. He never slept through these
nights, and he never even dozed; he was wide awake, and his mind
was silently working upon the particular problem that was uppermost
in his thoughts. He never rose until he had solved it or at least
until he had decided upon a course of action. He would then get
up abruptly, go to bed, and sleep like a child. The one thing
that made it possible for a man of his delicate frame, racked
as it was by anxiety and over work, to keep steadily at his task,
was the wonderful gift which he possessed of sleeping.

Page had thought out many problems in this way. The tension
caused by the sailing of the Dacia, in January, 1915, and
the deftness with which the issue had been avoided by substituting
a French for a British cruiser, has already been described. Page
discovered this solution on one of these all-night self-communings.
It was almost two o'clock in the morning that he rose, said to
himself, " I've got it!" and then went contentedly to
bed. And during the anxious months that followed the Lusitania,
the Arabic, and those other outrages which have now
taken their place in history, he spent night after night turning
the matter over in his mind. But he found no way out of the humiliations
presented by the policy of Washington.

"Here we are swung loose in time," he wrote to his
son Arthur, a few days after the first Lusitania note had
been sent to Germany, nobody knows the day or the week or the
month or the year---and we are caught on this island, with no
chance of escape, while the vast slaughter goes on and seems just
beginning, and the degradation of war goes on week by week; and
we live in hope that the United States will come in, as the only
chance to give us standing and influence when the reorganization
of the world must begin. (Beware of betraying the word 'hope'!)
It has all passed far beyond anybody's power to describe. I simply
go on day by day into unknown experiences and emotions, seeing
nothing before me very clearly and remembering only dimly what
lies behind. I can see only one proper thing: that all the world
should fall to and hunt this wild beast down.

"Two photographs of little Mollie(<A NAME="n114"></A><A
HREF="Pagenotes.htm#114">114</A>) on my mantelpiece recall persons
and scenes and hopes unconnected with the war: few other things
can. Bless the baby, she couldn't guess what a sweet purpose she
serves."

The sensations of most Americans in London during this crisis
are almost indescribable. Washington's failure promptly to meet
the situation affected them with astonishment and humiliation.
Colonel House was confident that war was impending, and for this
reason he hurried his preparations to leave England; he wished
to be in the United States, at the President's side, when the
declaration was made. With this feeling about Mr. Wilson, Colonel
House received a fearful shock a day or two after the Lusitania
had gone down: while walking in Piccadilly, he caught a glimpse
of one of the famous sandwich men, bearing a poster of an afternoon
newspaper. This glaring broadside bore the following legend: "We
are too proud to fight---Woodrow Wilson." The sight of that
placard was Colonel House's first intimation that the President
might not act vigorously. He made no attempt to conceal from Page
and other important men at the American Embassy the shock which
it had given him. Soon the whole of England was ringing with these
six words; the newspapers were filled with stinging editorials
and cartoons, and the music halls found in the Wilsonian phrase
materials for their choicest jibes. Even in more serious quarters
America was the subject of the most severe denunciation. No one
felt these strictures more poignantly than President Wilson's
closest confidant. A day or two before sailing home he came into
the Embassy greatly depressed at the prevailing revulsion against
the United States. "I feel," Colonel House said to Page,
"as though I had been given a kick at every lamp post coming
down Constitution Hill." A day or two afterward Colonel House
sailed for America.

.

II

And now came the period of distress and of disillusionment.
Three Lusitania notes were sent and were evasively answered,
and Washington still seemed to be marking time. The one event
in this exciting period which gave Page satisfaction was Mr. Bryan's
resignation as Secretary of State. For Mr. Bryan personally Page
had a certain fondness, but as head of the State Department the
Nebraska orator had been a cause of endless vexation. Many of
Page's letters, already printed, bear evidence of

the utter demoralization which existed in this branch of the
Administration and this demoralization became especially glaring
during the Lusitania crisis. No attempt was made even at
this momentous period to keep the London Embassy informed as to
what was taking place in Washington; Page's letters and cablegrams
were, for the most part, unacknowledged and unanswered, and the
American Ambassador was frequently obliged to obtain his information
about the state of feeling in Washington from Sir Edward Grey.
It must be said, in justice to Mr. Bryan, that this carelessness
was nothing particularly new, for it had worried many ambassadors
before Page. Readers of Charles Francis Adams's correspondence
meet with the same complaints during the Civil War; even at the
time of the Trent crisis, when for a fortnight Great Britain
and the United States were living on the brink of war, Adams was
kept entirely in the dark about the plans of Washington.(<A NAME="n115"></A><A
HREF="Pagenotes.htm#115">115</A>) The letters of John Hay show
a similar condition during his brief ambassadorship to Great Britain
in 1897-1898.(<A NAME="n116"></A><A HREF="Pagenotes.htm#116">116</A>)

But Mr. Bryan's incumbency was guilty of diplomatic vices which
were peculiarly its own. The "leaks" in the State Department,
to which Page has already referred, were constantly taking place;
the Ambassador would send the most confidential cipher dispatches
to his superior, cautioning the Department that they must be held
inviolably secret, and then he would pick up the London newspapers
the next morning and find that everything had been cabled from
Washington. To most readers, the informal method of conducting
foreign business, as it is disclosed in these letters, probably
comes as something of a shock. Page is here discovered discussing
state matters, not in correspondence with the Secretary of State,
but in private unofficial communications to the President, and
especially to Colonel House---the latter at that time not an official
person at all. All this, of course, was extremely irregular and,
in any properly organized State Department, it would have been
even reprehensible. But the point is that there was no properly
organized State Department at that time, and the impossibility
of conducting business through the regular channels compelled
Page to adopt other means. "There is only one way to reform
the State Department," he informed Colonel House at this
time. "That is to raze the whole building, with its archives
and papers, to the ground, and begin all over again."

This state of affairs in Washington explains the curious fact
that the real diplomatic history of the United States and Great
Britain during this great crisis is not to be found in the archives
of the State Department, for the official documents on file there
consist of the most routine telegrams, which are not particularly
informing, but in the Ambassador's personal correspondence with
the President, Colonel House, and a few other intimates. The State
Department did not have the first requisite of a properly organized
foreign office, for it could not be trusted with confidential
information. The Department did not tell Page what it was doing,
but it apparently told the whole world what Page was doing. It
is an astonishing fact that Page could not write and cable the
most important details, for he was afraid that they would promptly
be given to the reporters.

"I shall not send another confidential message to the
State Department," Page wrote to Colonel House,

September 15, 1914; "it's too dangerous. Time and time
again now the Department has leaked. Last week, I sent a dispatch
and I said in the body of it, 'this is confidential and under
no condition to be given out or made public, but to be regarded
as inviolably secret.' The very next morning it was telegraphed
from Washington to the London newspapers. Bryan telegraphed me
that he was sure it didn't get out from the Department and that
he now had so fixed it that there could be no leak. He's said
that at least four times before. The Department swarms with newspaper
men, I hear. But whether it does or not the leak continues. I
have to go with my tail between my legs and apologize to Sir Edward
Grey and to do myself that shame ---and to do my very best to
keep his confidence---against these unnecessary odds. The only
way to be safe is to do the job perfunctorily, to answer the questions
the Department sends and to do nothing on your own account. That's
the reason so many of our men do their jobs in that way---or one
reason and a strong one. We can never have an alert and energetic
and powerful service until men can trust the Department and until
they can get necessary information from it. I wrote the President
that of course I'd go on till the war ended and all the questions
growing out of it were settled, and that then he must excuse me,
if I must continue to be exposed to this danger and humiliation.
In the meantime, I shall send all my confidential matter in private
letters to him."

Page did not regard Mr. Bryan's opinions and attitudes as a
joke: to him they were a serious matter and, in his eyes, Bryan
was most interesting as a national menace. He regarded the Secretary
as the extreme expression of an irrational sentimentalism that
was in danger of undermining the American character, especially
as the kind of thought he represented was manifest in many phases
of American life. In a moment of exasperation, Page gave expression
to this feeling in a letter to his son:

.

<P ALIGN=CENTER>To Arthur W. Page

London, June 6, 1915.

DEAR ARTHUR:

. . . We're in danger of being feminized and fad-ridden-grape
juice (God knows water's good enough: why grape juice?); pensions;
Christian Science; peace cranks; efficiency-correspondence schools;
aid-your-memory; women's clubs; co-this and co-t'other and coddling
in general; Billy Sunday; petticoats where breeches ought to
be and breeches where petticoats ought to be; white livers and
soft heads and milk-and-water;---I don't want war: nobody knows
its horrors or its degradations or its cost. But to get rid of
hyphenated degenerates perhaps it's worth while, and to free
us from 'isms and soft folk. That's the domestic view of it.
As for being kicked by a sauerkraut caste---O Lord, give us backbone!
Heartily yours,

W. H. P.

.

In the bottom of this note, Page has cut a notch in the paper
and against it he has written: "This notch is the place to
apply a match to this letter."

"Again and ever I am reminded," Page also wrote in
reference to Bryan's resignation, "of the danger of having
to do with cranks. A certain orderliness of mind and conduct seems
essential for safety in this short life. Spiritualists, bone-rubbers,
anti-vivisectionists, all sort of anti's in fact, those who have
fads about education or fads against it, Perfectionists, Daughters
of the Dove of Peace, Sons of the Roaring Torrent, itinerant peacemonger
---these may have a real genius among them once in forty years;
but to look for an exception to the common run of yellow dogs
and damfools among them is like opening oysters with the hope
of finding pearls. It's the common man we want and the uncommon
common man when we can find him---never the crank. This is the
lesson of Bryan."

At one time, however, Mr. Bryan's departure seemed likely to
have important consequences for Page. Colonel House and others
strongly urged the President to call him home from London and
make him Secretary of State. This was the third position in President
Wilson's Cabinet for which Page had been considered. The early
plans to make him Secretary of the Interior or Secretary of Agriculture
have already been described. Of all cabinet posts, however, the
one that would have especially attracted him would have been the
Department of State. But President Wilson believed that the appointment
of an Ambassador at one of the belligerent capitals, especially
of an Ambassador whose sympathies for the Allies were so pronounced
as were Page's, would have been an "unneutral" act,
and, therefore, Colonel House's recommendation was not approved.

.

<P ALIGN=CENTER>From Edward M. House

Roslyn, Long Island,
June 25th, 1915.

DEAR PAGE:

The President finally decided to appoint Lansing to succeed
Mr. Bryan. In my opinion, he did wisely, though I would have
preferred his appointing you.

The argument against your appointment was the fact that you
are an Ambassador at one of the belligerent capitals. The President
did not think it would do, and from what I read, when your name
was suggested I take it there would have been much criticism.
I am sorry---sorrier than I can tell you, for it would have worked
admirably in the general scheme of things.

However, I feel sure that Lansing will do the job, and that
you will find your relations with him in every way satisfactory.

The President spent yesterday with me and we talked much of
you. He is looking well and feeling so.

I read the President your letter and he enjoyed it as much
as I did.

I am writing hastily, for I am leaving for Manchester, Massachusetts,
where I shall be during July and August.

Your sincere friend,

E. M. HOUSE.

.

<P ALIGN=CENTER>III

But, in addition to the Lusitania crisis, a new terror
now loomed on the horizon. Page's correspondence reveals that
Bryan had more reasons than one for his resignation; he was now
planning to undertake a self-appointed mission to Europe for the
purpose of opening peace negotiations entirely on his own account.

.

<P ALIGN=CENTER>From Edward M. House

Manchester, Massachusetts,
August 12th, 1915.

DEAR PAGE:

The Bryans have been stopping with the X's. X writes me that
Bryan told him that he intended to go to Europe soon and try
peace negotiations. He has Lloyd George in mind in England, and
it is then his purpose to go to Germany.

I take it he will want credentials from the President which,
of course, he will not want to give, but just what he will feel
obliged to give is another story. I anticipated this when he
resigned. I knew it was merely a matter of time when he would
take this step.

He may find encouragement in Germany, for he is in high favour
now in that quarter. It is his purpose to oppose the President
upon the matter of "preparedness," and, from what we
can learn, it will not be long before there will be open antagonism
between the Administration and himself.

It might be a good thing to encourage his going to Europe.
He would probably come back a sadder and wiser man. I take it
that no one in authority in England would discuss the matter
seriously with him, and, in France, I do not believe he could
even get a hearing.

Please let me have your impressions upon this subject.

I wish I could be near you to-day for there are so many things
I could tell that I cannot write.

Your friend,

E. M. HOUSE.

.
<P ALIGN=CENTER>To Edward M. House

American Embassy, London [Undated].

DEAR HOUSE:

Never mind about Bryan. Send him over here if you wish to
get rid of him. He'll cut no more figure than a tar-baby at a
Negro camp-meeting. If he had come while he was Secretary, I
should have jumped off London Bridge and the country would have
had one ambassador less. But I shall enjoy him now. You see some
peace crank from the United States comes along every week---some
crank or some gang of cranks. There've been two this week. Ever
since the Daughters of the Dove of Peace met at The Hague, the
game has become popular in America; and I haven't yet heard that
a single one has been shot---so far. I think that some of them
are likely soon to be hanged, however, because there are signs
that they may come also from Germany. The same crowd that supplies
money to buy labour-leaders and the press and to blow up factories
in the United States keeps a good supply of peace-liars on tap.
It'll be fun to watch Bryan perform and never suspect that anybody
is lying to him or laughing at him; and he'll go home convinced
that he's done the job and he'll let loose doves all over the
land till they are as thick as English sparrows. Not even the
President could teach him anything permanently. He can do no
harm on this side the world. It's only your side that's in any
possible danger; and, if I read the signs right, there's a diminishing
danger there.

No, there's never yet come a moment when there was the slightest
chance of peace. Did the Emperor not say last year that peace
would come in October, and again this year in October? Since
he said it, how can it come?

The ambitions and the actions of men, my friend, are determined
by their antecedents, their surroundings, and their opportunities---the
great deeds of men before them whom consciously or unconsciously
they take for models, the codes they are reared by, and the chances
that they think they see. These influences shaped Alexander and
Caesar, and they shaped you and me. Now every monarch on the
Continent has behind him the Napoleonic example. "Can I
do that?" crosses the mind of everyone. Of course every
one thinks of himself as doing it beneficently---for the good
of the world. Napoleon, himself, persuaded himself of his benevolent
intentions, and the devil of it was he persuaded other people
also. Now the only monarch in Europe in our time who thought
he had a chance is your friend in Berlin. When he told you last
year (1914) that of course he didn't want war,. but that he was
"ready," that's what he meant. A similar ambition,
of course, comes into the mind of every professional soldier
of the continent who rises to eminence. In Berlin you have both---the
absolute monarch and the military class of ambitious soldiers
and their fighting machine.

Behind these men walks the Napoleonic ambition all the time,
just as in the United States we lie down every night in George
Washington's feather-bed of no entangling alliances.

Then remember, too, that the German monarchy is a cross between
the Napoleonic ambition and its inheritance from Frederick the
Great and Bismarck. I suppose the three damnedest liars that
were ever born are these three---old Frederick, Napoleon, and
Bismarck---not, I take it, because they naturally loved lying,
but because the game they played constantly called for lying.
There was no other way to play it: they had to fool people
all the time. You have abundant leisure---do this: Read the whole
career of Napoleon and write down the startling and exact parallels
that you will find there to what is happening to-day. The French
were united and patriotic, just as the Germans now are. When
they invaded other people's territory, they said they were attacked
and that the other people had brought on war. They had their
lying diplomats, their corruption funds; they levied money on
cities and states; they took booty; and they were God's elect.
It's a wonderful parallel---not strangely, because the game is
the same and the moral methods are the same.

Only the tools are somewhat different---the submarine, for
example. Hence the Lusitania disaster (not disavowed,
you will observe), the Arabic disaster, the propaganda,
underground and above, in the United States. And there'll be
more. The Napoleonic Wars were about eleven years long. I fancy
that we shall have war and wars from this attempt to dominate
Europe, for perhaps as long a period. The Balkans can't be quieted
by this war only, nor Russia and Italy perhaps. And Germany may
have a series of earthquakes herself---internal explosions. Then
Poland and perhaps some of the Scandinavian States. Nobody can
tell.

I cannot express my admiration of the President's management,
so far at least, of his colossal task of leading us right. He
has shown his supreme wisdom up to this point and I have the
profoundest confidence in his judgment. But I hope he doesn't
fool himself about the future; I'm sure he doesn't. I see no
possible way for us to keep out, because I know the ignorance
and falseness of the German leaders. They'll drown or kill more
Americans---on the sea and in America. They may at last
even attack one of our own passenger ships, or do something that
will dramatically reveal them to the whole American people. Then,
of course, the tune will be called. It's only a question of time;
and I am afraid the war will last long enough to give them time.
An early peace is all that can prevent them from driving us at
last into war; and I can see no chance of an early peace. You
had as well prepare as fast as the condition of public opinion
will permit.

There could be no better measure of the immeasurable moral
advance that the United States has made over Europe than the
incredulity of our people. They simply can't comprehend what
the Napoleonic legend can do, nor the low political morality
of the Continent---of Berlin in particular. Hence they don't
believe it. We have gone on for 100 years working might and main
to better our condition and the condition of people about us---the
greatest effort made by the largest number of people since the
world began to further the mood and the arts of peace. There
is no other such chapter in human history as our work for a hundred
years. Yet just a hundred years ago the Capitol at Washington
was burned by---a political oligarchy in the freest country of
Europe---as damnable an atrocity as you will find in history.
The Germans are a hundred years behind the English in political
development and political morality.

So, let Willum J. come. He can't hurt Europe---nor help it;
and you can spare him. Let all the Peace-gang come. You can spare
them, too; and they can do no harm here. Let somebody
induce Hoke Smith to come, too. You have hit on a great scheme---friendly
deportation.

And Bryan won't be alone. Daughters of the Dove of Peace and
Sons of the Olive Branch come every week. The latest Son came
to see me to-day. He said that the German Chancellor told him
that he wanted peace---wants it now and wants it bad, and that
only one thing stood in the way---if England would agree not
to take Belgium, Germany would at once make peace! This otherwise
sensible American wanted me to take him to see Sir Edward to
tell him this, and to suggest to him to go over to Holland next
week to meet the German Chancellor and fix it up. A few days
ago a pious preacher chap (American) who had come over to "fix
it all up," came back from France and called on me. He had
seen something in France---he was excited and he didn't quite
make it clear what he had seen; but he said that if they'd only
let him go home safely and quickly he'd promise not to mention
peace any more---did I think the American boats entirely safe?---So,
you see, I do have some fun even in these dark days.

Yours heartily,

W. H. PAGE.

.

<P ALIGN=CENTER>IV

This letter discloses that Page was pinning his faith in President
Wilson, and that he still had confidence in the President's determination
to uphold the national honour. Page was not one of those who thought
that the United States should declare war immediately after the
Lusitania. The President's course, in giving Germany a
chance to make amends, and to disavow the act, met with his approval,
and he found, also, much to admire in Mr. Wilson's first Lusitania
note. His judgment in this matter was based first of all upon
the merits of the case; besides this, his admiration for Mr. Wilson
as a public man was strong. To think otherwise of the President
would have been a great grief to the Ambassador and to differ
with his chief on the tremendous issue of the war would have meant
for Page the severance of one of the most cherished associations
of his life. The interest which he had shown in advocating Wilson's
presidential candidacy has already been set forth; and many phases
of the Wilson administration had aroused his admiration. The President's
handling of domestic problems Page regarded as a masterpiece in
reconciling statesmanship with practical politics, and his energetic
attitude on the Panama Tolls had introduced new standards into
American foreign relations. Page could not sympathize with all
the details of the Wilsonian Mexican policy, yet he saw in it
a high-minded purpose and a genuine humanitarianism. But the outbreak
of war presented new aspects of Mr. Wilson's mind. The President's
attitude toward the European struggle, his conception of "neutrality,"
and his failure to grasp the meaning of the conflict, seemed to
Page to show a lack of fundamental statesmanship; still his faith
in Wilson was deep-seated, and he did not abandon hope that the
President could be brought to see things as they really were.
Page even believed that he might be instrumental in his conversion.

But in the summer and autumn of 1915 one agony followed another.
The "too proud to fight" speech was in Page's mind nothing
less than a tragedy. The president's first Lusitania note
for a time restored the Ambassador's confidence; it seemed to
show that the President intended to hold Germany to that "strict
accountability" which he had threatened. But Mr. Wilson's
course now presented new difficulties to his Ambassador. Still
Page believed that the President, in his own way and in his own
time, would find a path out of his dilemma that would protect
the honour and the safety of the United States. If any of the
Embassy subordinates became impatient over the procedure of Washington,
he did not find a sympathetic listener in the Ambassador. The
whole of London and of Europe might be resounding with denunciations
of the White House, but Page would tolerate no manifestations
of hostility in his presence. "The problem appears different
to Washington than it does to us," he would say to his confidants.
"We see only one side of it; the President sees all sides.
If we give him all the facts, he will decide the thing wisely."
Englishmen with whom the Ambassador came into contact soon learned
that they could not become flippant or critical about Mr. Wilson
in his presence; he would resent the slightest hostile remark,
and he had a way of phrasing his rebukes that usually discouraged
a second attempt. About this time Page began to keep closely to
himself, and to decline invitations to dinners and to country
houses, even those with which he was most friendly. The reason
was that he could not meet Englishmen and Englishwomen, or even
Americans who were resident in England, on his old easy familiar
terms; he knew the ideas which everybody entertained about his
country, and he knew also what they were saying, when he was not
among them; the restraint which his presence necessarily put upon
his friends produced an uncongenial atmosphere, and the Ambassador
therefore gave up, for a time, those distractions which had ordinarily
proved such a delightful relief from his duties. For the first
time since he had come to England he found himself a solitary
man. He even refused to attend the American Luncheon Club in London
because, in speeches and in conversation, the members did not
hesitate to assail the Wilson policies.

Events, however, eventually proved too strong for the most
devoted supporter of President Wilson. After the Arabic and
the Hesperian, Page's official intimates saw signs that
the Ambassador was losing confidence in his old friend. He would
discuss Mr. Wilson occasionally, with those secretaries, such
as Mr. Laughlin, in whom his confidence was strongest; his expressions,
however, were never flippant or violent. That Page could be biting
as well as brilliant in his comments on public personages his
letters abundantly reveal, yet he never exercised his talent for
sarcasm or invective at the expense of the White House. He never
forgot that Mr. Wilson was President and that he was Ambassador;
he would still defend the Administration; and he even now continued
to find consolation in the reflection that Mr. Wilson was living
in a different atmosphere and that he had difficulties to confront
of which a man in London could know nothing. The Ambassador's
emotion was rather one of disappointment and sorrow, mingled with
anxiety as to the plight into which his country was being led.
As to his duty in this situation, however, Page never hesitated.
In his relations with his Embassy and with the British world he
maintained this non-critical attitude; but in his letters to President
Wilson and Colonel House, he was describing the situation, and
expressing his convictions, with the utmost freedom and frankness.
In both these attitudes Page was consistent and absolutely loyal.
It was his duty to carry out the Wilson instructions and he had
too high a conception of the Ambassadorial office to show to the
world any unfavourable opinions he may have held about his country's
course. His duty to his post made it just as imperative that he
set forth to the President the facts exactly as they were. And
this the Ambassador now proceeded to do. For the mere ornamental
dignities of an Ambassadorship Page cared nothing; he was wasting
his health in his duties and exhausting his private resources;
much as he loved the English and congenial as were his surroundings,
the fear of being recalled for "disloyalty" or insubordination
never influenced him. The letters which he now wrote to Colonel
House and to President Wilson himself are probably without parallel
in the diplomatic annals of this or of any other country. In them
he told the President precisely what Englishmen thought of him
and of the extent to which the United States was suffering in
European estimation from the Wilson policy. His boldness sometimes
astounded his associates. One day a friend and adviser of President
Wilson's came into the Ambassador's office just as Page had finished
one of his communications to Washington.

"Read that!" the Ambassador said, handing over the
manuscript to his visitor.

As the caller read, his countenance displayed the progressive
stages of his amazement. When he had finished, his hands dropped
helplessly upon his knees.

"Is that the way you write to the President? " he
gasped.

"Of course," Page replied, quietly. "Why not?
Why shouldn't I tell him the truth? That is what I am here for."

"There is no other person in the world who dare talk to
him like that!" was the reply.

This is unquestionably the fact. That President Wilson did
not like people about him whose views were opposed to his own
is now no secret, and during the period when his policy was one
of the great issues of the world there was probably no one except
Page who intruded upon his solitude with ideas that so abruptly
disagreed with the opinions of the White House. The letters which
Page wrote Colonel House were intended, of course, for the President
himself, and practically all of them Colonel House read aloud
to the head of the nation. The two men would closet themselves
in the old cabinet room on the second floor of the White House---that
same room in which Lincoln had met his advisers during Civil War
days; and here Colonel House would quietly read the letters in
which Page so mercilessly portrayed the situation as it appeared
in English and European eyes. The President listened impassively,
giving no sign of approval or disapproval, and hardly, at times,
of much interest. In the earlier days, when Page's letters consisted
of pictures of English life and English men, and colourful descriptions
of England under the stress of war, the President was vastly entertained;
he would laugh loudly at Page's wit, express his delight at his
graphic and pungent style and feel deeply the horrors of war as
his Ambassador unfolded them. " I always found Page compelling
on paper," Mr. Wilson remarked to Mr. Laughlin, during one
of the latter's visits to Washington. "I could never resist
him---I get more information from his letters than from any other
single source. Tell him to keep it up." It was during this
period that the President used occasionally to read Page's letters
to the Cabinet, expressing his great appreciation of their charm
and historical importance. "The President quoted from one
of the Ambassador's letters to the Cabinet to-day," a member
of the Cabinet wrote to Mrs. Page in February, 1915. 'Some day,'
the President said, 'I hope that Walter Page's letters will be
published. They are the best letters I have ever read. They make
you feel the atmosphere in England, understand the people, and
see into the motives of the great actors.' The President repeated
this statement many times, and his letters to Page show how greatly
he enjoyed and profited from this correspondence. But after the
sinking of the Lusitania and the Arabic his attitude
toward Page and his letters changed.

He now found little pleasure or satisfaction in the Page communications.
When Mr. Wilson found that one of his former confidants had turned
out to be a critic, that man instantaneously passed out of his
life. And this was now Page's fate; the friendship and associations
of forty years were as though they had never been. Just why Mr.
Wilson did not recall his Ambassador is a question that has puzzled
Page's friends. He would sometimes refer to him as a man who was
"more British than the British," as one who had been
taken completely captive by British blandishments, but he never
came to the point of dismissing him. Perhaps he did not care to
face the public scandal that such an act would have caused; but
a more plausible reason is that Page, despite the causes which
he had given for irritation, was indispensable to him. Page's
early letters had furnished the President ideas which had taken
shape in Wilson's policies, and, disagreeable as the communications
now became, there are evidences that they influenced the solitary
statesman in the White House, and that they had much to do in
finally forcing Mr. Wilson into the war. The alternative question,
as to why Page did not retire when he found himself so out of
sympathy with the President, will be sufficiently answered in
subsequent chapters; at present it may be said that he did resign
and only consented to remain at the urgent request of Washington.
In fact, all during 1915 and 1916, there seemed to be a fear in
Washington that Page would definitely abandon the London post.
On one occasion, when the newspapers published rumours to this
effect, Page received an urgent. despatch from Mr. Lansing. The
message came at a time---the date was October 26, 1915---when
Page was especially discouraged over the Washington policy. "Representatives
of the press," said Mr. Lansing, "have repeated rumours
that you are planning to resign. These have been brought to the
President's attention, and both he and I have denied them. Still
these rumours persist, and they cause both the President and me
great anxiety. We cannot believe that they are well founded.

"In view of the fact that they are so persistent, we have
thought it well to inform you of them and to tell you how earnestly
we hope that they are baseless. We trust that you will set both
our minds at rest."

If Page had ever had any compunction about addressing the President
in blunt phrases these expressions certainly convinced him that
he was a free agent.

Yet Page himself at times had his doubts as to the value of
this correspondence. He would frequently discuss the

matter with Mr. Laughlin. "That's a pretty harsh letter,"
he would say. "I don't like to talk that way to the President,
yet it doesn't express half what I feel."

"It's your duty to tell the President the real state of
affairs," Mr. Laughlin would urge.

"But do you suppose it does any good? " Page would
ask.

"Yes, it's bound to, and whether it does or not, it's
your business to keep him informed."

If in these letters Page seems to lay great stress on the judgment
of Great Britain and Europe on American policy, it must be remembered
that that was his particular province. One of an Ambassador's
most important duties is to transmit to his country the public
opinion of the country to which he is accredited. It was Page's
place to tell Washington what Great Britain thought of it; it
was Washington's business to formulate policy, after giving due
consideration to this and other matters.

.

<P ALIGN=CENTER>To Edward M. House

July 21, 1915.

DEAR HOUSE:

I enclose a pamphlet in ridicule of the President. I don't
know who wrote it, for my inquiries so far have brought no real
information. I don't feel like sending it to him. I send it to
you---to do with as you think best.

This thing alone is, of course, of no consequence. But it
is symptomatic. There is much feeling about the slowness with
which he acts. One hundred and twenty people (Americans) were
drowned on the Lusitania and we are still writing notes
about it---to the damnedest pirates that ever blew up a ship.
Anybody who knows the Germans knows, of course, that they are
simply playing for time, that they are not going to "come
down," that Von Tirpitz is on deck, that they'd just as
lief have war with us as not ---perhaps had rather---because
they don't want any large nation left fresh when the war ends.

They'd like to have the whole world bankrupt. There is a fast
growing feeling here, therefore, that the American Government
is pusillaninious---dallies with 'em, is affected by the German
propaganda, etc., etc. Of course, such a judgment is not fair.

It is formed without knowing the conditions in the United
States. But I think you ought to realize the strength of this
sentiment. No doubt before you receive this, the President will
send something to Germany that will amount to an ultimatum and
there will be at least a momentary change of sentiment here.
But looking at the thing in a long-range way, we're bound to
get into the war. For the Germans will blow up more American
travellers without notice. And by dallying with them we do not
change the ultimate result, but we take away from ourselves the
spunk and credit of getting in instead of being kicked and cursed
in. We've got to get in: they won't play the game in any other
way. I have news direct from a high German source in Berlin which
strongly confirms this. . . .

It's a curious thing to say. But the only solution that I
see is another Lusitania outrage, which would force war.

W. H. P.

P. S. The London papers every day say that the President will
send a strong note, etc. And the people here say, "Damn
notes: hasn't he written enough?" Writing notes hurts nobody---changes
nothing. The Washington correspondents to the London papers say
that Burleson, the Attorney-General, and Daniels are Bryan men

and are holding the President back.

.

The prophecy contained in this letter was quickly fulfilled.
A week or two after Colonel House had received it, the Arabic
was sunk with loss of American life.

Page was taking a brief holiday with his son Frank in Rowsley,
Derbyshire, when this news came. It was telegraphed from the Embassy.

"That settles it," he said to his son. "They
have sunk the Arabic. That means that we shall break with
Germany and I've got to go back to London."

.

<P ALIGN=CENTER>To Edward M. House

American Embassy, London, August 23, 1915.

DEAR HOUSE:

The sinking of the Arabic is the answer to the President
and to your letter to me. And there'll be more such answers.
You said to me one day after you had got back from your last
visit to Berlin: "They are impossible." I think you
told the truth, and surely you know your German and you know
your Berlin---or you did know them when you were here.

The question is not what we have done for the Allies, not
what any other neutral country has done or has failed to do---such
comparisons, I think, are far from the point. The question is
when the right moment arrives for us to save our self-respect,
our honour, and the esteem and fear (or the contempt) in which
the world will hold us.

Berlin has the Napoleonic disease. If you follow Napoleon's
career---his excuses, his evasions, his inventions, the wild
French enthusiasm and how he kept it up---you will find an exact
parallel. That becomes plainer every day. Europe may not be wholly
at peace in five years---may be ten.

Hastily and heartily,

W. H. P.

I have your note about Willum J.... Crank once, crank always.
My son, never tie up with a crank.

W. H. P.

.
<P ALIGN=CENTER>To Edward M. House

London, September 2nd, 1915.

DEAR HOUSE:

You write me about pleasing the Allies, the big Ally in particular.
That doesn't particularly appeal to me. We don't owe them anything.
There's no obligation. I'd never confess for a moment that we
are under any obligation to any of them nor to anybody. I'm not
out to "please" anybody, as a primary purpose: that's
not my game nor my idea---nor yours either. As for England in
particular, the account was squared when she twice sent an army
against us---in her folly---especially the last time when she
burnt our Capitol. There's been no obligation since. The obligation
is on the other foot. We've set her an example of what democracy
will do for men, an example of efficiency, an example of freedom
of opportunity. The future is ours, and she may follow us and
profit by it. Already we have three white English-speaking men
to every two in the British Empire: we are sixty per cent. of
the Anglo-Saxons in the world. If there be any obligation to
please, the obligation is on her to please us. And she feels
and sees it now.

My point is not that, nor is it what we or any other neutral
nation has done or may do---Holland or any other. This war is
the direct result of the over-polite, diplomatic, standing-aloof,
bowing-to-one-another in gold lace, which all European nations
are guilty of in times of peace---castes and classes and uniforms
and orders and such folderol, instead of the proper business
of the day. Every nation in Europe knew that Germany was preparing
for war. If they had really got together---not mere Hague Sunday-school
talk and resolutions---but had really got together for business
and had said to Germany, "The moment you fire a shot, we'll
all fight against you; we have so many millions of men, so many
men-of-war, so many billions of money; and we'll increase all
these if you do not change your system and your building-up of
armies"---then there would have been no war.

My point is not sentimental. It is:

(1) We must maintain our own self-respect and safety. If we
submit to too many insults, that will in time bring Germany against
us. We've got to show at some time that we don't believe, either,
in the efficacy of Sunday-School resolves for peace---that we
are neither Daughters of the Dove of Peace nor Sons of the Olive
Branch, and

(2) About nagging and forever presenting technical legal points
as lawyers do to confuse juries---the point is the point of efficiency.
If we do that, we can't carry our main points. I find it harder
and harder to get answers now to important questions because
we ask so many unimportant and nagging ones.

I've no sentiment---perhaps not enough. My gushing days are
gone, if I ever had 'em. The cutting-out of the "100 years
of peace" oratory, etc., etc., was one of the blessings
of the war. But we must be just and firm and preserve our own
self-respect and keep alive the fear that other nations have
of us; and we ought to have the courage to make the Department
of State more than a bureau of complaints. We must learn to say
"No" even to a Gawdamighty independent American citizen
when he asks an improper or impracticable question. Public opinion
in the United States consists of something more than the threats
of Congressmen and the bleating of newspapers; it consists of
the judgment of honourable men on courageous and frank actions---a
judgment that cannot be made up till action is taken.

Heartily yours,

W. H. P.

.
<P ALIGN=CENTER>To Edward M. House

American Embassy, London, Sept. 8, 1915.
(This is not prudent. It is only true---nothing more.)

DEAR HOUSE:

I take it for granted that Dumba(<A NAME="n117"></A><A HREF="Pagenotes.htm#117">117</A>)
is going, of course. But I must tell you that the President is
being laughed at by our best friends for his slowness in action.
I hardly ever pick up a paper without seeing some sarcastic remark.
I don't mean they expect us to come into the war. They only hoped
we would be as good as our word---would regard another submarine
attack on a ship carrying Americans as an unfriendly act and
would send Bernstorff home. Yet the Arabic and now the
Hesperian have had no effect in action. Bernstorff's personal
note to Lansing,(<A NAME="n118"></A><A HREF="Pagenotes.htm#118">118</A>)
even as far as it goes, does not bind his Government.

The upshot of all this is that the President is fast losing
in the minds of our best friends here all that he gained by his
courageous stand on the Panama tolls. They feel that if he takes
another insult---keeps taking them---and is satisfied with Bernstorff's
personal word, which is proved false in four days---he'll take
anything. And the British will pay less attention to what we
say. That's inevitable. If the American people and the President
accept the Arabic and the Hesperian and do nothing
to Dumba till the Government here gave out his letter, which
the State Department had (and silently held) for several days---then
nobody on this side the world will pay much heed to anything
we say hereafter.

This, as I say, doesn't mean that these (thoughtful) people
wish or expect us to go to war. They wish only that we'd prove
ourselves as good as the President's word. That's the conservative
truth; we're losing influence more rapidly than I supposed it
were possible.

Dumba's tardy dismissal will not touch the main matter, which
is the rights of neutrals at sea, and keeping our word in action.

Yours sincerely,

W. H. P.

P. S. They say it's Mexico over again---watchful waiting and
nothing doing. And the feeling grows that Bryan has really conquered,
since his programme seems to prevail.

.
<P ALIGN=CENTER>To Edward M. House

London, Tuesday night, Sept. 8, 1915.

DEAR HOUSE:

The Germans seem to think it a good time to try to feel about
for peace. They have more to offer now than they may have again.
That's all. A man who seriously talks peace now in Paris or in
London on any terms that the Germans will consider, would float
dead that very night in the Seine or in the Thames. The Germans
have for the time being "done-up" the Russians; but
the French have shells enough to plough the German trenches day
and night (they've been at it for a fortnight now); Joffre has
been to see the Italian generalissimo; and the English destroy
German submarines now almost as fast as the Germans send them
out. I am credibly told that several weeks ago a group of Admiralty
men who are in the secret had a little dinner to celebrate the
destruction of the 50th submarine.

While this is going on, you are talking on your side of the
water about a change in German policy! The only change is that
the number of submarines available becomes smaller and smaller,
and that they wish to use Uncle Sam's broad, fat back to crawl
down on when they have failed.

Consequently, they are laughing at Uncle Sam here---it comes
near to being ridicule, in fact, for seeming to jump at Bernstorff's
unfrank assurances. And, as I have telegraphed the President,
English opinion is---well, it is very nearly disrespectful. Men
say here (I mean our old friends) that with no disavowal of the
Lusitania, the Falaba, the Gulflight, or the Arabic
or of the Hesperian, the Germans are "stuffing"
Uncle Sam, that Uncle Sam is in the clutches of the peace-at-any-price
public opinion, that the United States will suffer any insult
and do nothing. I hardly pick up a paper that does not have a
sarcastic paragraph or cartoon. We are on the brink of convincing
the English that we'll not act, whatever the provocation. By
the English, I do not mean the lighter, transitory public opinion,
but I mean the thoughtful men who do not wish us or expect us
to fire a gun. They say that the American democracy, since Cleveland's
day, has become a mere agglomeration of different races, without
national unity, national aims, and without courage or moral qualities.
And (I deeply regret to say) the President is losing here the
high esteem he won by his Panama tolls repeal. They ask, why
on earth did he raise the issue if under repeated provocation
he is unable to recall Gerard or to send Bernstorff home? The
Hesperian followsthe Arabic; other "liners"
will follow the Hesperian, if the Germans have
submarines.

And, when Sackville-West(<A NAME="n119"></A><A HREF="Pagenotes.htm#119">119</A>)
was promptly sent home for answering a private citizen's inquiry
about the two political parties, Dumba is (yet awhile) retained
in spite of a far graver piece of business. There is a tone of
sad disappointment here---not because the most thoughtful men
want us in the war (they don't), but because for some reason,
which nobody here understands, the President, having taken a
stand, seems unable to do anything.

All this is a moderate interpretation of sorrowful public
opinion here. And the result will inevitably be that they will
pay far less heed to anything we may hereafter say. In fact men
now say here every day that the American democracy has no opinion,
can form no opinion, has no moral quality, and that the word
of its President never gets as far as action even of the mildest
form. The atmosphere is very depressing. And this feeling has
apparently got beyond anybody's control. I've even heard this
said: "The voice of the United States is Mr. Wilson's: its
actions are controlled by Mr. Bryan."

So, you see, the war will go on a long long time. So far as
English opinion is concerned, the United States is useful to
make ammunition and is now thought of chiefly in this connection.
Less and less attention is paid to what we say. Even the American
telegrams to the London papers have a languid tone.

Yet recent revelations have made it clearer than ever that
the same qualities that the English accuse us of having are in
them and that these qualities are directly to blame for this
war. I recall that when I was in Germany a few weeks, six years
ago, I became convinced that Germany had prepared to fight England;
I didn't know when, but I did know that was what the war-machine
had in mind. Of course, I had no opportunities to find out anything
in particular. You were told practically that same thing by the
Kaiser, before the war began. "We are ready," said
he. Of course the English feared it and Sir Edward put his whole
life into his effort to prevent it. The day the war began, he
told me with tears that it seemed that his life had been wasted---that
his life work had gone for naught.---Nobody could keep from wondering
why England didn't---

(Here comes a parenthesis. Word came to me a little while
ago that a Zeppelin was on its way to London. Such a remark doesn't
arouse much attention. But just as I had finished the fifth line
above this, Frank and Mrs. Page came in and challenged me to
play a game of cards before we should go to bed. We sat down,
the cards were dealt, and bang! bang!---with the deep note of
an explosion. A third, a fourth shot. We went into the street.
There the Zeppelin was revealed by a searchlight ---sailing along.
I think it had probably dropped its bombs; but the aircraft guns
were cracking away at it. Some of them shot explosive projectiles
to find the range. Now and then one such explosive would almost
reach the Zeppelin, but it was too high for them and it sailed
away, the air guns doing their ineffectual best. I couldn't see
whether airplanes were trying to shoot it or not. The searchlight
revealed the Zeppelin but nothing else. While we were watching
this battle in the air, the maids came down from the top of the
house and went into the cellar. I think they've already gone
back. You can't imagine how little excitement it caused. It produces
less fright than any other conceivable engine of war.

We came back as soon as the Zeppelin was out of sight and
the firing had ceased; we played our game of cards; and here
I am writing you the story---all within about half an hour.---There
was a raid over London last night, too, wherein a dozen or two
women and children and a few men were killed. I haven't the slightest
idea what harm this raid to-night has done. For all I know it
may not be all done. But of all imaginable war-experiences this
seems the most futile. It interrupted a game of cards for twenty
minutes!)

Now---to go on with my story: I have wondered ever since the
war began why the Allies were not better prepared---especially
England on land. England has just one big land gun---no more.
Now it has turned out, as you have doubtless read, that the British
Government were as good as told by the German Government that
Germany was going to war pretty soon---this in 1912 when Lord
Haldane(<A NAME="n120"></A><A HREF="Pagenotes.htm#120">120</A>)
was sent to make friends with Germany.

The only answer he brought back was a proposition that England
should in any event remain neutral---stand aside while Germany
whipped Russia and France. This insulting proposal was kept secret
till the other day. Now, why didn't the British Cabinet inform
the people and get ready? They were afraid the English people
wouldn't believe it and would accuse them of fomenting war. The
English people were making money and pursuing their sports. Probably
they wouldn't have believed it. So the Liberal Cabinet went on
in silence, knowing that war was coming, but not exactly when
it was coming, and they didn't make even a second big gun.

Now here was the same silence in this "democracy"
that they now complain of in ours. Rather an interesting and
discouraging parallel---isn't it? Public opinion has turned Lord
Haldane out of office because he didn't tell the public what
he declares they wouldn't have believed. If the English had raised
an army in 1912, and made a lot of big guns, Austria would not
have trampled Serbia in the earth. There would have been no war
now; and the strong European Powers might have made then the
same sort of protective peace-insurance combine that they will
try to make after this war is ended. Query: A democracy's inability
to act---how much is this apparently inherent quality
of a democracy to blame for this war and for---other things?

When I am asked every day "Why the United States doesn't
do something---send Dumba and Bernstorff home? "---Well,
it is not the easiest question in the world to answer.

Yours heartily,

W. H. P.

P. S. This is the most comical of all worlds: While I was
writing this, it seems the maids went back upstairs and lighted
their lights without pulling their shades down ---they occupy
three rooms, in front. The doorbell rang furiously. Here were
more than half a dozen policemen and special constables---must
investigate!" One light would be turned on, another would
go out; another one on!"--etc., etc. Frank tackled them,
told 'em it was only the maids going to bed, forgetting to pull
down the shades. Spies and signalling were in the air! So, in
the morning, I'll have to send over to the Foreign Office and
explain. The Zeppelin did more "frightfulness" than
I had supposed, after all. Doesn't this strike you as comical?

W. H. P.

Friday, September 10, 1915.

P. S. The news is just come that Dumba is dismissed. That
will clear the atmosphere---a little, but only a little. Dumba
committed a diplomatic offence. The German Government has caused
the death of United States citizens, has defied us, has declared
it had changed its policy and yet has gone on with the same old
policy. Besides, Bernstorff has done everything that Dumba did
except employ Archibald, which was a mere incident of the game.
The President took a strong stand: they have disregarded it---no
apology nor reparation for a single boat that has been sunk.
Now the English opinion of the Germans is hardly a calm, judicial
opinion---of course not. There may be facts that have not been
made known. There must be good reasons that nobody here can guess,
why the President doesn't act in the long succession of German
acts against us. But I tell you with all solemnity that British
opinion and the British Government have absolutely lost their
respect for us and their former high estimate of the President.
And that former respect is gone for good unless he acts now very
quickly.(<A NAME="n121"></A><A HREF="Pagenotes.htm#121">121</A>)They will pay nothing more than formal and polite attention
to anything we may hereafter say. This is not resentful. They
don't particularly care for us to get into the war. Their feeling
(I mean among our best old friends) is not resentful. it is simply
sorrowful. They had the highest respect for our people and our
President. The Germans defy us; we sit in silence. They conclude
here that we'll submit to anything from anybody. We'll write
strong notes---nothing more.

I can't possibly exaggerate the revulsion of feeling. Members
of the Government say (in private, of course) that we'll submit
to any insult. The newspapers refuse to publish articles which
attempt to make the President's silence reasonable. "It
isn't defensible," they say, "and they would only bring
us thousands of insulting letters from our readers." I can't
think of a paper nor of a man who has a good word to say for
us---except, perhaps, a few Quaker peace-at-any-price people.
And our old friends are disappointed and sorrowful. They feel
that we have dropped out of a position of influence in the world.

I needn't and can't write more. Of course there are more important
things than English respect. But the English think that every
Power has lost respect for us---the Germans most of all. And
(unless the President acts very rigorously and very quickly)
we'll have to get along a long time without British respect.

W. H. P.

P. S. The last Zeppelin raid---which interrupted the game
of cards---killed more than twenty persons and destroyed more
than seven million dollars' worth of private business property---all
non-combatants!

W. H. P.

.
<P ALIGN=CENTER>To Edward M. House

21st of September, 1915.

DEAR HOUSE:

The insulting cartoon that I enclose (destroy it without showing
it) is typical of, I suppose, five hundred that have appeared
here within a month. This represents the feeling and opinion
of the average man. They say we wrote brave notes and made courageous
demands, to none of which a satisfactory reply has come, but
only more outrages and no guarantee for the future. Yet we will
not even show our displeasure by sending Bernstorff home. We've
simply "gone out," like a snuffed candle, in the regard
and respect of the vast volume of British opinion. (The last
Punch had six ridiculing allusions to our "fall.")

It's the loneliest time I've had in England. There's a tendency
to avoid me.

They can't understand here the continued declaration in the
United States that the British Government is trying to take our
trade---to use its blockade and navy with the direct purpose
of giving British trade profit out of American detentions. Of
course, the Government had no such purpose and has done no such
thing---with any such purpose. It isn't thinking about trade
but only about war.

The English think they see in this the effect on our Government
and on American opinion of the German propaganda. I have had
this trade-accusation investigated half a dozen times---the accusation
that this Government is using its military power for its own
trade advantage to our detriment: it simply isn't true. They
stop our cargoes, not for their advantage, but wholly to keep
things from the enemy. Study our own trade reports.

In a word, our importers are playing (so the English think)
directly into the hands of the Germans. So matters go on from
bad to worse.

Bryce(<A NAME="n122"></A><A HREF="Pagenotes.htm#122">122</A>)
is very sad. He confessed to me yesterday the utter hopelessness
of the two people's ever understanding one another.

The military situation is very blue---very blue. The general
feeling is that the long war will begin next March and end---nobody
dares predict.

W. H. P.

P. S. There's not a moral shadow of a doubt, (1) that the
commander of the submarine that sunk the Arabic isdead---although he makes reports to his government! nor (2)
that the Hesperian was torpedoed. The State Department

has a piece of the torpedo.

.

<P ALIGN=CENTER>V

The letters which Page sent directly to the President were
just as frank. "Incidents occur nearly every day," he
wrote to President Wilson in the autumn of 1915, "which reveal
the feeling that the Germans have taken us in. Last week one of
our naval men, Lieutenant McBride, who has just been ordered home,
asked the Admiralty if he might see the piece of metal found on
the deck of the Hesperian. Contrary to their habit, the
British officer refused. 'Take my word for it,' he said. 'She
was torpedoed. Why do you wish to investigate? Your country will
do nothing--will accept any excuse, any insult and---do nothing.'
When McBride told me this, I went at once to the Foreign Office
and made a formal request that this metal should be shown to our
naval attaché, who (since Symington is with the British
fleet and McBride has been ordered home) is Lieutenant Towers.
Towers was sent for and everything that the Admiralty knows was
shown to him and I am sending that piece of metal by this mail.
But to such a pass has the usual courtesy of a British naval officer
come. There are many such instances of changed conduct. They are
not hard to endure nor to answer and are of no consequence in
themselves but only for what they denote. They're a part of war's
bitterness. But my mind runs ahead and I wonder how Englishmen
will look at this subject five years hence, and it runs afield
and I wonder how the Germans will regard it. A sort of pro-German
American newspaper correspondent came along the other day from
the German headquarters; and he told me that one of the German
generals remarked to him: 'War with America? Ach no! Not war.
If trouble should come, we'd send over a platoon of our policemen
to whip your little army.' (He didn't say just how he'd send 'em.)"

.

<P ALIGN=CENTER>To the President

American Embassy, London, Oct. 5, 1915.

DEAR MR. PRESIDENT:

I have two letters that I have lately written to you but which
I have not sent because they utterly lack good cheer. After reading
them over, I have not liked to send them. Yet I should fail of
my duty if I did not tell you bad news as well as good.

The high esteem in which our Government was held when the
first Lusitania note to Germany was sent seems all changed
to indifference or pity---not hatred or hostility, but a sort
of hopeless and sad pity. That ship was sunk just five months
ago; the German Government (or its Ambassador) is yet holding
conversations about the principle involved, making "concessions"
and promises for the future, and so far we have done nothing
to hold the Germans to accountability.(<A NAME="n123"></A><A
HREF="Pagenotes.htm#123">123</A>) In the meantime their submarine
fleet has been so reduced that probably the future will take
care of itself and we shall be used as a sort of excuse for their
failure. This is what the English think and say; and they explain
our failure to act by concluding that the peace-at-any-price
sentiment dominates the Government and paralyzes it. They have
now, I think, given up hope that we will ever take any action.

So deeply rooted (and, I fear, permanent) is this feeling
that every occurrence is made to fit into and to strengthen this
supposition. When Dumba was dismissed, they said: "Dumba,
merely the abject tool of German intrigue. Why not Bernstorff?"
When the Anglo-French loan(<A NAME="n124"></A><A HREF="Pagenotes.htm#124">124</A>)
was oversubscribed, they said: "The people's sympathy is
most welcome, but their Government is paralyzed." Their
respect has gone---at least for the time being.

It is not that they expect us to go to war: many, in fact,
do not wish us to. They expected that we would be as good as
our word and hold the Germans to accountability. Now I fear they
think little of our word. I shudder to think what our relations
might be if Sir Edward Grey were to yield to another as Foreign
Minister, as, of course, he must yield at some time.

The press has less to say than it had a few weeks ago. Punch,
for instance, which ridiculed and pitied us in six cartoons
and articles in each of two succeeding numbers, entirely forgets
us this week. But they've all said their say. I am, in a sense,
isolated---lonely in a way that I have never before been. I am
not exactly avoided, I hope, but I surely am not sought. They
have a polite feeling that they do not wish to offend me and
that to make sure of this the safest course is to let me alone.
There is no mistaking the great change in the attitude of men
I know, both in official and private life.

It comes down and comes back to this---that for five months
after the sinking of the Lusitania the Germans are yet
playing with us, that we have not sent Bernstorff home, and hence
that we will submit to any rebuff or any indignity. It is under
these conditions---under this judgment of us---that we now work---the
English respect for our Government indefinitely lessened and
instead of the old-time respect a sad pity. I cannot write more.

Heartily yours,

WALTER H. PAGE.

"I have authoritatively heard," Page writes to President
Wilson in early September, "of a private conversation between
a leading member of the Cabinet and a group of important officials
all friendly to us in which all sorrowfully expressed the opinion
that the United States will submit to any indignity and that no
effect is now to be hoped for from its protests against unlawful
submarine attacks or against anything else. The inactivity of
our Government, or its delay, which they assume is the same as
inactivity, is attributed to domestic politics or to the lack
of national, consciousness or unity.

"No explanation has appeared in the British press of our
Government's inactivity or of any regret or promise of reparation
by Germany for the sinking of the Lusitania, the Falaba,
the Gulflight, the Nebraskan, the Arabic,
or the Hesperian, nor any explanation of a week's silence
about the Dumba letter; and the conclusion is drawn that, in the
absence of action by us, all these acts have been practically
condoned.

"I venture to suggest that such explanations be made public
as will remove, if possible, the practically unanimous conclusion
here that our Government will permit these and similar future
acts to be explained away. I am surprised almost every hour by
some new evidence of the loss of respect for our Government, which,
since the sinking of the Arabic, has become so great as
to warrant calling it a complete revulsion of English feeling
toward the United States. There is no general wish for us to enter
the war, but there is genuine sorrow that we are thought to submit
to any indignity, especially after having taken a firm stand.
I conceive I should be lacking in duty if I did not report this
rapid and unfortunate change in public feeling, which seems likely
to become permanent unless facts are quickly made public which
may change it."

There are many expressions of such feelings in Page's letters
of this time. They brought only the most perfunctory acknowledgment
from the White House. On January 3, 1916, Page sent the President
a mass of clippings from the British press, all criticizing the
Wilson Administration in unrestrained terms. In his comment on
these, he writes the President:

"Public opinion, both official and unofficial, is expressed
by these newspaper comments, with far greater restraint than it
is expressed in private conversation. Ridicule of the Administration
runs through the programmes of the theatres; it inspires hundreds
of cartoons; it is a staple of conversation at private dinners
and in the clubs. The most serious class of Englishmen, including
the best friends of the United States, feel that the Administration's
reliance on notes has reduced our Government to a third or fourth-rate
power. There is even talk of spheres of German influence in the
United States as in China. No government could fall lower in English
opinion than we shall fall if more notes are sent to Austria or
to Germany. The only way to keep any shred of English respect
is the immediate dismissal without more parleying of every German
and Austrian official at Washington. Nobody here believes that
such an act would provoke war.

"I can do no real service by mincing matters. My previous
telegrams and letters have been purposely restrained as this one
is. We have now come to the parting of the ways. If English respect
be worth preserving at all, it can be preserved only by immediate
action. Any other course than immediate severing of diplomatic
relations with both Germany and Austria will deepen the English
opinion into a conviction that the Administration was insincere
when it sent the Lusitania notes and that its notes and
protests need not be taken seriously on any subject. And English
opinion is allied opinion. The Italian Ambassador(<A NAME="n125"></A><A
HREF="Pagenotes.htm#125">125</A>) said to me, 'What has happened?
The United States of to-day is not the United States I 'knew fifteen
years ago, when I lived in Washington.' French officers and members
of the Government who come here express themselves even more strongly
than do the British. The British newspapers to-day publish translations
of ridicule of the United States from German papers."

.

<P ALIGN=CENTER>To the President

London, January 5, 1916.

DEAR MR. PRESIDENT:

I wish---an impossible thing of course---that some sort of
guidance could be given to the American correspondents of the
English newspapers. Almost every day they telegraph about the
visits of the Austrian Chargé or the German Ambassador
to the State Department to assure Mr. Lansing that their governments
will of course make a satisfactory explanation of the latest
torpedo-act in the Mediterranean or to "take one further
step in reaching a satisfactory understanding about the Lusitania."
They usually go on to say also that more notes are in preparation
to Germany or to Austria. The impression made upon the European
mind is that the German and Austrian officials in Washington
are leading the Administration on to endless discussion, endless
notes, endless hesitation. Nobody in Europe regards their pledges
or promises as worth anything at all: the Arabic follows
the Lusitania, the Hesperian follows the Arabic,
the Persia follows the Ancona. "Still
conferences and notes continue," these people say, "proving
that the American Government, which took so proper and high a
stand in the Lusitania notes, is paralyzed---in a word
is hoodwinked and 'worked' by the Germans." And so long
as these diplomatic representatives are permitted to remain in
the United States, "to explain," "to parley"
and to declare that the destruction of American lives and property
is disavowed by their governments, atrocities on sea and land
win of course continue; and they feel that our Government, by
keeping these German and Austrian representatives in Washington,
condones and encourages them and their governments.

This is a temperate and even restrained statement of the English
feeling and (as far as I can make out) of the whole European
feeling.

It has been said here that every important journal published
in neutral or allied European countries, daily, weekly, or monthly,
which deals with public affairs, has expressed a loss of respect
for the United States Government and that most of them make continuous
severe criticisms (with surprise and regret) of our failure by
action to live up to the level of our Lusitania notes.
I had (judiciously) two American journalists, resident here---men
of judgment and character---to inquire how true this declaration
is. After talking with neutral and allied journalists here and
with men whose business it is to read the journals of the Continent,
they reported that this declaration is substantially true---that
the whole European press (outside Germany and its allies) uses
the same tone toward our Government that the English press uses---to-day,
disappointment verging on contempt; and many of them explain
our keeping diplomatic intercourse with Germany by saying that
we are afraid of the German vote, or of civil war, or that the
peace-at-any-price people really rule the United States and have
paralyzed our power to act---even to cut off diplomatic relations
with governments that have insulted and defied us.

Another (similar) declaration is that practically all men
of public influence in England and in the European allied and
neutral countries have publicly or privately expressed themselves
to the same effect. The report that I have about this is less
definite than about the newspapers, for, of course, no one can
say just what proportion of men of public influence have so expressed
themselves; but the number who have so expressed themselves is
overwhelming.

In this Kingdom, where I can myself form some opinion more
or less accurate, and where I can check or verify my opinion
by various methods---I am afraid, as I have frequently already
reported, that the generation now living will never wholly regain
the respect for our Government that it had a year ago. I will
give you three little indications of this feeling; it would be
easy to write down hundreds of them:

(One) The governing class: Mr. X [a cabinet member] told Mrs.
Page a few nights ago that for sentimental reasons only he would
be gratified to see the United States in the war along with the
Allies, but that merely sentimental reasons were not a sufficient
reason for war---by no means; that he felt most grateful for
the sympathetic attitude of the large mass of the American people,
that he had no right to expect anything from. our Government,
whose neutral position was entirely proper. Then he added; "But
what I can't for the life of me understand is your Government's
failure to express its disapproval of German utter disregard
of its Lusitania notes. After eight months, it has done
nothing but write more notes. My love for America, I must confess,
is offended at this inaction and---puzzled. I can't understand
it. You will pardon me, I am sure."

(Two) "Middle Class" opinion: A common nickname
for Americans in the financial and newspaper districts London
is "Too-prouds."

(Three) The man in the street: At one of the moving picture
shows in a large theatre a little while ago they filled in an
interval by throwing on the screen the picture of the monarch,
or head of state, and of the flag of each of the principal nations.
When the American picture appeared, there was such hissing and
groaning as caused the managers hastily to move that picture
off the screen.

Some time ago I wrote House of some such incidents and expressions
as these; and he wrote me that they were only part and parcel
of the continuous British criticism of their own Government---in
other words, a part of the passing hysteria of war. This remark
shows how House was living in an atmosphere of illusion.

As the matter stands to-day our Government has sunk lower,
as regards British and European opinion, than it has ever been
in our time, not as a part of the hysteria of war but as a result
of this process of reasoning, whether it be right or wrong:

We said that we should hold the Germans to strict accountability
on account of the Lusitania. We have not settled that
yet and we still allow the German Ambassador to discuss it after
the Hesperian and other such acts showed that his Arabic
pledge was worthless.

The Lusitania grows larger and larger in European memory
and imagination. It looks as if it would become the great type
of war atrocities and barbarities. I have seen pictures of the
drowned women and children used even on Christmas cards. And
there is documentary proof in our hands that the warning, which
was really an advance announcement, of that disaster was paid
for by the German Ambassador and charged to his Government. It
is the Lusitania that has caused European opinion to regard
our foreign policy as weak. It is not the wish for us to go to
war. No such general wish exists.

I do not know, Mr. President, who else, if anybody, puts these
facts before you with this complete frankness. But I can do no
less and do my duty.

No Englishman---except two who were quite intimate friends---has
spoken to me about our Government for months, but I detect all
the time a tone of pity and grief in their studied courtesy and
in their avoidance of the subject. And they talk with every other
American in this Kingdom. It is often made unpleasant for Americans
in the clubs and in the pursuit of their regular business and
occupations; and it is always our inaction about the Lusitania.
Our controversy with the British Government causes little
feeling and that is a sort of echo of the Lusitania. They
feel that we have not lived up to our promises and professions.

That is the whole story.

Believe me always heartily,

WALTER H. PAGE.

This dismissal of Dumba and of the Attaches has had little
more effect on opinion here than the dismissal of the Turkish
Ambassador.(<A NAME="n126"></A><A HREF="Pagenotes.htm#126">126</A>)
Sending these was regarded as merely kicking the dogs of the

man who had stolen our sheep.

.

<P ALIGN=CENTER>VI

One of the reasons why Page felt so intensely about American
policy at this time was his conviction that the severance of diplomatic
relations, in the latter part of 1915, or the early part of 1916,
in itself would have brought the European War to an end. This
was a conviction from which he never departed. Count Bernstorff
was industriously creating the impression in the United States
that his dismissal would immediately cause war between Germany
and the United States, and there is little doubt that the Administration
accepted this point of view. But Page believed that this was nothing
but Prussian bluff. The severance of diplomatic relations at that
time, in Page's opinion, would have convinced the Germans of the
hopelessness of their cause. In spite of the British blockade,
Germany was drawing enormous quantities of food supplies from
the United States, and without these supplies she could not maintain
indefinitely her resistance. The severance of diplomatic relations
would naturally have been accompanied by an embargo suspending
trade between the United States and the Fatherland. Moreover,
the consideration that was mainly leading Germany to hope for
success was the belief that she could embroil the United States
and Great Britain over the blockade. A break with Germany would
of course mean an end to that manoeuvre. Page regarded all Mr.
Wilson's attempts to make peace in 1914 and early 1915---before
the Lusitania---as mistakes,for reasons that have
already been set forth. Now, however, he believed that the President
had a real opportunity to end the war and the unparalleled suffering
---which it was causing. The mere dismissal of Bernstorff, in
the Ambassador's opinion, would accomplish this result.

In a communication sent to the President on February 15, 1916,
he made this plain.

.

<P ALIGN=CENTER>To the President

February 15, 7 P. M.

The Cabinet has directed the Censor to suppress, as far as
he can with prudence, comment which is unfavourable to the United
States. He has taken this action because the public feeling against
the Administration is constantly increasing. Because the Lusitania
controversy has been going on so long, and because the Germans
are using it in their renewed U-boat campaign, the opinion of
this country has reached a point where only prompt action can
bring, a turn in the tide. Therefore my loyalty to you would
not be complete if I should refrain from sending, in the most
respectful terms, the solemn conviction which I hold about our
opportunity and our duty.

If you immediately refuse to have further parley or to yield
one jot or tittle of your original Lusitania notes, and
if you at once break diplomatic relations with the German Empire,
and then declare the most vigorous embargo of the Central Powers,
you will quickly end the war. There will be an immediate collapse
in German credit. If there are any Allies who are wavering, such
action will hold them in line. Certain European neutrals---Sweden,
Rumania, Greece, and others---will put up a firm resistance to
Germanic influences and certain of them will take part with Great
Britain and France. There will be an end at once to the German
propaganda, which is now world-wide. The moral weight of our
country will be a determining influence and bring an early peace.
The credit you will receive for such a decision will make you
immortal and even the people of Germany will be forever grateful.

It is my conviction that we would not be called upon to fire
a gun or to lose one human life.

Above all, such an action will settle the whole question of
permanent peace. The absolute and grateful loyalty of the whole
British Empire, of the British Fleet, and of all the Allied countries
will be ours. The great English-speaking nations will be able
to control the details of the peace and this without any formal
alliance. There will be an incalculable saving of human life
and of treasure. Such an act will make it possible for Germany
to give in honourably and with good grace because the whole world
will be against her. Her bankrupt and blockaded people will bring
such pressure to bear that the decision will be hastened.

The sympathies of the American people will be brought in line
with the Administration.

If we settle the Lusitania question by compromising
in any way your original demands, or if we permit it to drag
on longer, America can have no part in bringing the war to an
end. The current of allied opinion will run so strongly against
the Administration that no censorship and no friendly interference
by an allied government can stem the distrust of our Government
which is now so strong in Europe.

We shall gain by any further delay only a dangerous, thankless,
and opulent isolation. The Lusitania is the turning point
in our history. The time to act is now.